The times are growing harder, for all of the worlds. In Lyra's world, the Armoured Bears and Witches grow anxious within the frozen wastelands of the north, where further south, dæmons grow fearful. Even in Will's World, people are beginning to feel anxious, though they are not sure why. A war is coming. A war that threatens to engulf all of the worlds. It is the war of the Authority and the Republic of Heaven, created by Lord Asriel himself to overthrow the monarchy of the Almighty. And thrown in the middle of this, are two children, destined to hold the greatest weapons known to all the worlds. So what will you do? Will you fight to defend the Authority, or join Lord Asriel to help bring about its destruction. Armies are mustering, and the time is drawing nearer. Every person makes a difference. What will your's be?

Lord Asriel has opened a bridge to the city seen in the aurora borealis, and he has taken it upon himself to travel to the city in the clouds. Accompanying him is Marisa Coulter, and together, they have travelled to the other worlds, leaving Lyra's World, perhaps for good. A furious Magisterium has excommunicated the both of them, and stripped Lord Asriel of his title, and his possessions in Lyra's World. The bridge itself is sealed, as the Magisterium is now struggling to prevent others from accessing it.

But Lord Asriel's act has triggered other anamolies in Lyra's World, as strange windows have opened everywhere. They are nearly invisible to the naked eye, but sightings of them have been reported, and they are growing in number.

Meanwhile, the Magisterium has to contend with a serious breach of security where a large group of Republican commandos have infiltrated the grounds of the College of St Jerome's. Stringent reviews are now being undertaken of the Magisterium's security measures.

And at Oxford, Ryan Whitman is testing something which could change the world as we speak...

All character profiles, new worlds, and other related pieces of work (RP and fanfictions included) belong to the respective authors/makers and may not be reproduced in anyway without permission from them. However, the world of His Dark Materials, The Golden Compass, and the general setting of the RP belongs to Philip Pullman. Site disclaimer here. No copyright infringement intended.

Remus

SettingThere has been a massive unexplained blackout in London and Oxford. Everything which runs on anbaric energy has stopped working. This includes the new furnicular trains which are now stuck in tunnels and anbaric lights which do not work. Radio communications have been similarly disrupted. Telephones have been patchy, at best.

It is now 8am on a Sunday. Not everyone knows what has happened due to the collapse in communications.

But Magisterium officers who reside in the College of St Jerome will have noticed a sudden increase in activity at the College of St Jerome...

Chronology of Events22/07 - A massive blackout has occurred. Everything which runs on anbaric energy has stopped working. There is static in the radios. The telephones are patchy.

ParticipantsAnyone! It is entirely up to you how your character(s) will react to this. Their participation will determine the way this will play out!

Your characters are welcome to create new threads to deal with the fallout of this incident/interact with other characters. To keep things in order, please post all related threads in this board only!

If you would like to participate with an NPC character, please post with the NPC account. Details below:Username: NPCPassword: password

Unlockable Event #1If more than three characters (NPC's included lodge police reports or otherwise create a loud ruckus over the blackout, the Magisterium will immediately declare a curfew.

If less than three characters (NPC's included) create a loud ruckus, or otherwise deal with this matter calmly, the Magisterium will devote their attention and resources elsewhere and the people will be free to come up with other ways to overcome this blackout.

OthersMembers who do not want to participate in this can continue posting as normal in the other boards.

With the last of the posts and character profiles sorted through accordingly, we are now back in business! There is a bit of tidying up and housekeeping to do, but for all intents and purposes, we are back.

All old threads have been sorted into the "Time Portal" board. Members can still post in this board to conclude their threads and plots. Old threads which either (i) involve dormant characters; or (ii) have been naturally concluded, are now in the Archives. The Archives are read only.

Please let me know if some of the threads are in a place where they shouldn't be. I'll move them to their rightful place accordingly.

No threads or character profiles have been deleted. Please let me know if you cannot find your profile or thread and I will contact Jcink Support.

I intend to launch a new plot event next week and I need your help to tell me how you want to play this! Please leave your comments in the thread here. Otherwise, do feel free to plot amongst yourselves in the Plotting board. Start threads! Have fun!

I will be finalising the channels and bots in our Discord server tomorrow. In the meantime, all members who pop into our server right now will be awarded an exclusive Discord title - Trailblazer. More Discord ranks will soon be available.

Dust sheets have been thrown off, old threads and characters archived, and one question remains.

What do you want to do next?

Seeing as we now have characters from Will's World with Windows XP levels of technology, I thought it would be a good idea to have these characters bring their technology into Lyra's World and disrupt the Magisterium's activities! That way, we have a plot campaign which everyone can participate in and spin the Aurora in a fresh direction.

However, I'm happy to discuss this with everyone to see how we think about it. Or perhaps one of you has an even better suggestion. Leave your comments down below.

I plan to roll out our new plot event next weekend. Can't wait to see what ideas you guys have in the meantime.

Given how successful the Aurora's Discord channel is right now, and how convenient it would be for some of our members to RP on Discord, I am trying out a new OOC RP channel at our Discord server.

How will this work?All members with characters (new or old, whether currently accepted or not for RP-ing or not) can choose to RP in the OOC themed RP channel here. There will be no minimum word counts for posts, but there will be no Godmodding of other characters, and no sex, violence or murder. Members are free to Godmode the Avengers and other NPC's themselves.

Nothing which happens in the OOC RP channel will affect the character's main plotlines in the board.

And yes, you can introduce other OC characters from other fandoms if you want. This will be your only chance for cross-fandom play in the Aurora.

Themed?Your characters will be interacting in themed environments. This month's theme is The Battle of New York featured in The Avengers. Here's a clip: The Battle of New York

Essentially, your characters will be placed in the middle of the Battle of New York. Will they be running for their lives? Will they be joining the Avengers to fight the Chitauri? Will they be gawking and taking pictures? The answer is up to you!

Note that your characters will never die. Whether they know that or not is up to you.

I don't know anything about anyone's characters!Please post your character details in the Quick Profiles channel here. This is a basic cheatsheet of your character (should take no longer than 5 minutes), which should help everyone reacquaint themselves with the Aurora.

How long will this event run for?The initial plan is to refresh the themes every month. Happy to adjust this depending on how this plays out.

I have recommendations/suggestions on future themes!Send me a note. You know where to find me.

The Aurora was one of the (if not the) last boards available for RP-ing in the world of HDM. And so long as there are people willing to thread and plot, I will do my best to make that happen again in the Aurora.

I won't lie. I will not, and may never be as active as I previously was in the Aurora. I will only be able to post and plot during weekends. And there may be some weekends where I will disappear because of real life commitments. But I will be posting. In the meantime, I have to ask for your patience.

That's all I have to say. Everything below is a set of questions which I hope will assist you in reacquainting yourself with the Aurora.

The Aurora - General Housekeeping

Will the Aurora ever close?Never. I may disappear for a period of time again due to work but you will still be able to sign up and access your character profiles or posts, and RP as normal. I have not deleted any character profiles or posts since the inception of the Aurora. Let me know if you cannot find your character profile or post and I will contact Jcink support.

I want to come back! But I want to amend my characters and wipe my slate clean!Please do. Let me know which posts you want me to archive and I will do so. I can also move your characters from the confirmed characters page to the WIP board. Just say the word.

What are you going to do with these inactive characters?I will be archiving them in time. Don't worry. Nothing will be deleted and these characters can be resurrected at any time. Just say the word.

Remus, I don't have time to post/have no interesting in posting anymore. But I want to stay and shoot the breeze!Please do. From now on, you do not have to create an account with the Aurora to post in our Discord (additional information below). Neither do you have to create a character or RP if you have an existing account with the Aurora.

I am not interested in RP-ing anymore. I want to take my character profile and delete my account.That's a shame. Please let me know if you can't find the character profile and posts you want to save and I will contact Jcink support.

What's Discord?It's an upgraded version of our old cbox, with the ability to embed GIF's and Spotify.

But I don't have an account with Discord!Our Discord is guest friendly. Just type your username in and prove that you are human by doing the CAPTCHA thing.

Remus, I failed the CAPTCHA test and can't use Discord!Freeze all motor functions.Send me additional information about your error and I will tweet Discord's help desk.

What about my old cbox messages? Some of them were important!I will see if I can send you a copy of your cbox messages. Please get in touch with me separately.

Site Wide Campaigns and Plots, Going ForwardMy aim is to transition the Aurora from the previous model, where I run and organise the plots and activities by myself, to a self-sustaining model, where members can organise plot points as and when they want to do so. That way, I will be able to disappear from the board for several weeks due to work, and you guys will have something to do. I had, and still have very ambitious ideas for the Aurora's plot and campaigns, but unfortunately, I do not have the time or energy to implement all of them at the moment.

What's the timeline like?This will be a soft reboot, so your characters are now three years older than they were before. The Magsterium and the Republic of Heaven are still locked in a power struggle, with the Republicans doing increasingly amoral activities. Republicans will say that these actions are justified, that the Magisterium will not pay attention otherwise. And they may be right. But at what cost?

Are you looking for mods or a co-admin to help?Yes! PM me if you are interested and we can work something out.

What about the last campaign - The Chernobyl Incident?I am more than happy to continue to plot this out if there is interest, even if it's only one of you. Let me know.

Otherwise, I will conclude the campaign and archive it as a read only thread.

And then what?Then we thread. Plot. Post. Do what we do best and see what happens.

To get everyone reacquainted with each other, I will be throwing an OOC welcome back party. This thread should be up by next weekend. Nothing that happens in this party will actually happen in the real timeline and no one is obliged to post in the party. But to those who do, it might be a good idea for us and our characters to hang out together again.

That's it! Let's see how things go, moving forward. I don't know what's going to happen. But I am pretty excited for this next phase of the Aurora's journey.